Liberal PAC highlights Ted Cruz’s House influence

Ted Cruz’s influence in House Republican politics is attracting lots of attention on the right — but the left is taking notice too.

American Bridge, a liberal political action committee, has gobbled up the domain name for www.speakercruz.com, which redirects to a National Review story about Cruz’s Thursday discussions with conservative House members about steering them away from plans offered by House Speaker John Boehner (R-Ohio) to raise the debt ceiling and focus instead on leveraging an impending government shutdown to defund Obamacare.

Text Size

“We’re messing with Boehner,” said the spokesman. “We’ll see over the coming weeks who runs the show.”

Cruz has conferred with conservative House members in their attempts to strip Obamacare funding from a bill that would keep the government open. He’s been a nettlesome force for House GOP leadership and his coordination with members of the lower chamber is no secret.

“We have had numerous conversations with numerous members of the House but at the end of the day all 435 members of the House are elected by the people in their districts and each member of the house has a responsibility to listen to their constituents,” Cruz told reporters Friday.